#where they will not commit to making a character a true villain OR to redeeming them

[leggerefiore]

Can I ask for Maxie, Archie, and Colress touching themselves while smelling their s/o's clothes. (I should have been more specific the first time I requested. Sorry 😭)

yeah, please be specific! villains is such a wide category, and i usually have a 4 character limit on requests! but either way, I did want to include these three but struggled to scneario build for it. so here they are💔

cw: 18+ content, masturbation,

characters: Maxie, Archie, Colress

☀️Maxie🌋

🪨 He did not usually like to commit to such acts. Not for any particularly specific reason, it was mostly that he felt it consumed time that he could otherwise be putting elsewhere. Though, he would admit that there were moments where his mind would wander away from his computer screen and into thoughts that he often left unexplored. This was unfortunately one of those times. He pulled away from his computer and pushed up his glasses to rub his eyes. Why? His thoughts were suddenly consumed with images that he felt could wait for later. Maxie tried to suppress them. He thought of something else desperately, like Numels or Archie, but neither of those could end his issue. Instead, a thought of you wearing a Numel hoodie made everything all the more worse for the Magma Leader.

🪨 He undid his shorts and made sure that his teleporter was locked as he pulled out his dick from its confines. His heart raced as he tried to think of this as some form of maintenance. This was just human nature — everyone did it. His hand awkwardly gripped his length as he began to pump it. You kept entering his mind. How you looked in your Magma uniform was a prominent one. He was technically your leader, too. One order could see you on your knees before him in a desk chair. A moan left him as he began to move his hand more naturally. More pleasure surged through his system. Would you have your hood up? No, no — He wanted to see your face. Maxie swallowed as his movements grew rougher and uneven.

🪨 Yet, before the red-head could cum and relieve himself of this ceaseless torment, the teleporter activated. A scream came from his as he ripped his hand away from his dick and tried to make himself look presentable. He thought he turned off access. His heart raced at the thought of some grunt seeing him in such a state — or worse, one of his admins. That was not the case, however, as you entered in and cocked a brow up at him. He was fully aware that you, of all people, would know what he was doing at a glance. You made your way over to him and knelt between his legs. His breath hitched. “You, too, then?” you tilted your head as you grabbed his dick with your hand and began pumping him, “It's been a while since we had, Maxie. Let's enjoy ourselves for a moment.” The Magma leader's fantasy came true with a lot more.

🌧Archie🌊

💧 The Aqua Leader crashed against his bed with a sigh. Of all times for you to step out to the market in Slateport, it had to be when he suddenly had a spike in his libido. He grabbed one of your shirts off from the floor and smelled with a sigh. All his work to help redeem himself from his actions had been keeping him busy and away from you. Which meant no sex. His admittedly high sex drive was in competition with his need to fix what he had caused with Kyogre. It finally won, and you were not here to help him with it. You must have been missing him, too. He grumbled as he sat up. Well, it was not like he could not handle this himself. The teleporter to his room was off already, and he felt like he could make due.

💧 He slid off his wetsuit, feeling freed from the tight clothing was he clutched your shirt tightly. His hand found his half-hard cock, and he began to easily fall into a comfortable rhythm. Archie wished you were here. Somehow, the image of you pressed underneath him while wearing his anchor had lodged itself in his head and drove him half-mad. His movements became harsh as he lost himself in the fantasy. You would both be pressed against each other in the bed as he rutted into you. The cold metal of his anchor turning hot from your shared body heat. He groaned at the thought of your digging your nails into the muscles of his back. His other hand came up to push off his bandana, it feeling way too hot on his head. He bucked his hips into his grip as he felt himself getting closer and closer to the edge.

💧 It did not come, however. The sound of the teleporter activating made him panic. His heart was racing as he froze in place. He knew he turned it off. Before he could wrap his head around what happened, you emerged from it with a bag on your arm. You looked around the room for a second before landing on him. His hand let his cock go as he rushed over to you. Your bag was dropped on the floor as he pulled you in for a kiss. You eagerly returned the affection and let him tug away at your clothes while leading you back to the bed. Soon enough, he had you underneath him, just like his fantasy. “Archie, honey,” you broke the kiss for a moment to look him in the eyes, “Just text me next time.” He made a mental note of it as you let out a wonderful noise.

🛸Colress🥼

🧪 As much as he loathed pulling away from his work, he would admit that he found his own body's reactions and needs a bit fascinating. Plus, he supposed he could multitask. Colress did not usually deal with random raises in his libido, but he knew that being with a partner long term could make some changes happen. He grabbed his tablet and noted the time it had begun eagerly alongside what thought may have brought it out. You had gone out for a while. Could that be a factor? There were so many things for him to note. He nearly forgot about his erection in his eagerness to figure out the possible reason why. Of course, it made itself apparent again.

🧪 He sighed as he momentarily pulled away from his theorising to unbutton his slacks and free his dick. Sliding off his gloves, he began to pump his cock in a methodical manner while trying to note the sensations. Colress felt his breaths grow quicker as he thought more and more on it. You had brought this out, he was certain. A thought of you laid on in his lab coat for some reason. Why was it so appealing? You were nude, sure, but why the lab coat? A groan left him as he began to quicken his pace while thinking on it. You were beckoning him in his head, asking for him to use one of his personally made sex toys on you. The thought of bringing out the Colress Machine S-35 to use on you made his pumping grow sporadic and random. His muscles tensed, and he expected himself to reach orgasm. 

🧪 Except, you calling his name broke his imagination and drug him back to reality. He put his tablet down to see you standing in the entrance of his lab with confusion and worry written across your face. You rushed in but froze when you saw him. Your expression then became that of minor annoyance and relief. “I thought you had hurt yourself when I came in and heard you groaning,” you sighed and moved to stand before him, “Colress, what in the world were you doing?” There was little time to explain. Instead, he asked that you strip and put on one of his spare lab coats. You stared at him for a moment in silent disbelief before shrugging and doing what he said. The sight instantly brought back up his libido. But, before he could make any notes, you crawled in his lap and straddled him. It seemed his theories really would have to come later.

[yuikomorii]

Heya! In which of the boys route do you think Yui was broken/hurt the most?

I always wanted to know which would be the worst scenario (route) for like.. an avarage girl irl . I know most girls would not survive there😅 but just wanted to know your opinion which of those 6 doors you would never open. Or 13 if we count all the characters.

// Since it's an otome game, it goes without saying that there will be a lot of plot armor and that the love interests can't really harm the heroine seriously throughout the route, regardless of what she does, because the plot would go nowhere like that. Most characters are jerks but not really that hard to handle, since they were known for scaring Yui rather than letting her get genuinely hurt. However there were certain Diaboys who were very scary, as it felt like they had no feelings of remorse or empathy.

Laito:

Can’t say that his HDB route is the worst thing Rejet has ever written (because it’s definitely not) but it baffled me how he was so okay with Yui breaking like that to the point where she lost all her will to live and only wanted to be set free from him. I mean, she literally tried to commit and he was just there not even intending to stop her bleeding veins despite being the one who cut them?? It’s true that in the Vampire Ending she doesn’t turn out that bad but after all, this is just because it’s fiction.

Kanato:

He was easier to understand than Laito because at least you were able to know that he had a soft spot for sweets and Teddy. Nevertheless, it was a bit too much how he kept stabbing Yui with the fork and a few chapters later, I’m pretty sure he stabbed Yui with a knife in more places as well. Still, it’s surprising how she turned out worse in his route, considering the fact that in the afterstory she kills innocent people—

Kou:

I love Kou but he was a literal demon in MB. I really hated how he made his fans bully Yui JUST FOR FUN. It wasn’t even any sort of punishment, he merely wanted to make her suffer. Another thing I couldn’t stand was how he kept putting Yui’s life in danger, only to make her prove her love. I understand wanting to test someone but it would have been way better if he actually saved Yui after seeing her do something dangerous. That way it would have proved that he cared for her yet he continued to watch her get hurt for him over and over again, without feeling any empathy. He was sorta redeemed at the end but yeah, most of his route was big yikes, especially since you wouldn’t have expected a cheerful and friendly idol like him to be such a wicked person.

Carla:

I like the Tsukinami family's desire to preserve their lineage but sorry, I must say that I find it repulsive that a 17-year-old would be forced to become pregnant out of the blue with strangers. I understand that Yui was partially to blame for Carla's anger and subsequent dungeon scene but that moment grossed me out sooo bad. She lost her will to live but Carla literally jumped on a depressed girl and was on the verge of rap€ing her, if his Endzeit didn’t kick in. He gets gradually better throughout his route but this scene left a sore taste in my mouth.

Kino:

Look, Kino is a great villain and a lot of fun, but his LE route was trash. Kino killed a child, mistreated Yui, abducted both Yui and Ayato, planned to sell Ayato to the church for execution, manipulated Yui and tortured Ayato. The pain he caused them both was immense and although I appreciated Yui calling him out, it's so sad that she was brainwashed. While it's true that Kino can be quite cute when he wants to, their romance was so rushed and forced because they didn't give us any reason why Yui would fall for him other than manipulation when Ayato, who was seen to care more about her than for himself, was right there. I wish they developed Kino’s feelings better, given that he straight up blackmailed Yui to become his, otherwise Ayato would had been killed, therefore Yui had no other choice but accept the situation. That’s why his CL route is way better.

I only mentioned 5 instead of 6 but that’s mostly because no other character came closer to them in terms of bad scenario. The rest of them felt decent in their routes for a game called Diabolik Lovers, lol.

[tainbocuailnge]

So a friend of mine who I talk with about FGO says Ashiya Douman is one of the most irredeemable assholes in all of FGO b/c his acts of evil were way more personal than most antagonists and he was ALWAYS like this (it isn't just servant BS), the entire reason the Heian-Kyo story exists is b/c Chaldea is going after him so even Ritsuka should hate him. I just want to know how much of a monster he truly is or if my friend is just SUPER fixating on the bad parts (it helps to get other opinions).

obligatory disclaimer that i read heian kyo in the form of fallacies' fantranslations and I'm still in atlantis on NA

at the end of heian kyo we get a scene of the living ashiya douman trying to kill himself because he knows all the crimes caster of limbo committed were rooted in feelings that he indeed harbours and it horrifies him. he's horrified that all it took to break him was hearing "at this rate you'll never surpass seimei even once" in his own voice. he's horrified that he's capable of doing the things caster of limbo did and his sense of morality says he should kill himself for knowing the conditions under which he will break. it's seimei who talks him out of it, even though seimei knows douman in panhuman history was nearing his breaking point at this time and would soon indeed start committing numerous great evils.

is ashiya douman an irredeemable person? caster of limbo, who is ashiya douman's inferiority complex over forever being seimei's ridiculed rival combined with two gods who are both ill-defined but likewise designated as targets for hatred, wants you to believe this, because the purpose given to him by the alien god is to be an insufferable irredeemable clown bastard. ashiya douman also believes this, because the feelings at the root of caster of limbo are real. is it true though?

although the historical abe no seimei is widely known and beloved, and ashiya douman is consequently almost as much of a household name, not much is known about douman at all beyond the few stories where he gets clowned on to make seimei look better. is douman a villain just because we mostly know him from stories where the hero defeats him? caster of limbo was unable to become a beast of humanity because he lacked the love for humanity necessary to become a stepping stone for humanity's growth. he also failed to become a plague upon humanity because ashiya douman does not hate humanity and does not want to destroy it. ultimately, all he ever wanted was simply to surpass his friend and rival seimei even just once.

limbo is the afterlife for people not evil enough for hell and not good enough for heaven. when he tries to do good he fails to become a hero. when he tries being evil he fails to become the final boss. there is much evil in ashiya douman, certainly, and you need far more than two hands to count his crimes. there is much evil in many people, and there are many circumstances in which it will reveal itself. he's good at psychologically torturing people because he's intimately familiar with how insecurities can ruin a person and his job as alter ego was to bring out the worst in people. his acts of evil are way more personal than most others because he has no greater goal he wants to achieve, he has no other purpose than to be an insufferable irredeemable clown until he's backed into a corner and realizes that he does have something he wants to achieve, namely proving that he can achieve anything at all.

if you ask me, ashiya douman's character is meant to make you ask how useful "redeemability" even is in assessing a person's worth. when playing house with nursery rhyme he requests the role of mother in law because the nature of his legend is to be the hated person that makes everyone else look better by comparison, regardless of anything he actually did. he's obsessed with people who lost something important to them that they want to get back at all cost, and he gets his claws in them by offering them a way to get revenge, to show those who wronged them what they can really do. he wants to help just as much as he wants to hurt, and in many of the cases in the game those two end up being the same thing and mostly causing a lot of problems for everyone and especially chaldea, but that doesn't exclude that there are circumstances in which he would have helped more than hurt. if things were different maybe he wouldn't have ended up like this, and who's to say things can't still be different?

is ashiya douman irredeemable? this is not the right question to ask in this game. nobody in fate is ever truly irredeemable as long as they're willing to learn and grow, and alter ego ashiya douman shows up in chaldea so that he might learn to understand love.

[sapphic-agent]

Ooh, we're talking about Rei? Alright, here we go!

The Todoroki family arc WAS one of the greater aspects of MHA. Keyword: was. It was great until Horikoshi decides to redeem Endeavor. The same man who practically bought his wife. The same man who neglected his three other children, Fuyumi was parentified, neglected Toya and Natso, Toya had constant breaks of his neglect, made a 5-year-old Shoto THROW UP from training so hard, physically and emotionally abused the shit out of his wife where she was on the verge of a mental breakdown everyday. Like, it's so disgusting, honestly. It's a slap in the fact to all of their trauma. Like Endeavor had YEARS to change, but randomly wants to change??? Like dude gave zero shits that Toya "DIED" via from his mental breakdown of his flames and carried on like nothing fucking happened. Also, I just wanna say people who also villainize Fuyumi can also get a big fuck you. Fuyumi just wanted a normal ass family and pushed all of her feelings in her traditional, sexist household. People react to trauma in different ways. Sure, Fuyumi doesn't always handle things the greatest, but the girl was made to look over her siblings at a young ass age. The problem with redeeming Endeavor is that, there's just somethings you can't say sorry for or fucking atone for. Buying your wife, neglecting all three of your kids, physically abusing your youngest son, physically and emotionally abusing your wife then locking her away from her children for 10 years is just not grounds to redeem someone. I thought MHA was good because Shoto saying fuck you to his dad and not forgiving was so refreshing but then paints Natsuo as the bad guy for not forgiving him, and having Shoto consider forgiving his father within one FUCKING YEAR after YEARS of abuse is just baffling to me. Ik Horikoshi is shit on writing women, but, I want to know what Rei is like outside of her dynamic of being a mom. I wanna know what her true personality is, because her abuse doesn't define her. I wanna also know more about Fuyumi because it's clear to me her parentification even carried over into adult, and even with her teaching elementary kids. Fuyumi also deserves to be pissed off at Endeavor. Shoto, Natsuo, and Dabi have shown them being PISSED at Endeavor, and they have EVERY right to. I just wanna see Fuyumi growing out of her parentification Endeavor clearly put her through.

fuck endeavor and his big toe looking ass People can change, yes. But not abusers who do the most godawful things to their family and don't atone for it. Fuck Endeavor.

Well said, anon👏🏾

I agree that the Todoroki past was a really good aspect of the MHA world before they redeemed Endeavor. It was a great aspect of world-building and it was refreshing seeing a character that wasn't begging for their abusive parent's love or acceptance. Then, 4/5 of his victims decided to rally around him and support him for the mess he created...

Why.

I'm actually really glad you brought up Fuyumi because I agree. She wasn't only neglected, she was parentified. And this wasn't something that happened when Touya died or Rei was committed, via the Touya flashback her parentification started at least around the time Natsu was born. She wants a normal family because it's the only way she knows how to cope with that childhood trauma (yes, parentification is traumatic). Yes, she doesn't go about it in a great way but we need to stop expecting victims to react perfectly. Nastu and Shoto made the choice to play nice to make her happy, she didn't force or demand them to.

Fuyumi, overall, deserves more agency. It would have been great for both her and Rei to be something outside of their trauma and supporting their abuser. They also deserve to be angry.

(I've noticed that Hori doesn't really make women in his story angry. I mean, Mirko sometimes but that's more her gag than anything. They all either cry or when they're being "strong" he just gives them this face 😐 (I'm not exaggerating: Rei, Momo, Inko, Uraraka, etc.) I mean, I don't expect a shonen mamgaka to know how to write feminine rage well, but MHA is just pathetic when it comes to this)

Hori got me fucked up for the way he treats Natsu. He's the only one able to see last the trauma/abuse (probably because he was the most removed from it) to be able to make healthy choices and create boundaries. Yet Hori over here wants to paint him in a negative light for calling out Endeavor repeatedly. It's the same thing with people who criticize Bakugou; they're made out to be in the wrong (Monoma, the pros, the journalists, etc.) even though what they're saying is completely valid.

I would also like to point out that Endeavor only changed once he got what he wanted. Not when his son died because of him. If he was going to really change, don't you think it should have been when his actions resulted in dire consequences?

[princess-of-the-corner]

Can we get a full rant about the Paris special?

You're probably going to get more out of me once it fully airs but for now just.

The evil characters motivations just kinda suck for comparing them to the originals. Which again: I don't want to do because I hate the 'oh this other person had the same trauma and handled it better' thing, but when it's the same character going through the same trauma it's bullshit.

Shadybug's reason for being evil sucks because it's literally just 'she didn't meet Alya' which is supposed to be part of the Derision Retcon of how awful Chloé was even though it doesn't match with anything we saw in Season 1-3 but I can ignore that because it commits a worse crime: Letting us know that if Marinette didn't meet Alya that exact day, she would've gone full murderous villain before the day was over. Like literally Alya is the only thing different, which means even Canon!Mari is just one bad day from snapping and killing everyone.

Claw Noir makes no goddamn sense because Canon!Adrien was able to healthily handle his mother's 'death' even having Canon!Gabriel as his abusive neglectful bastard of a father. How is it that a version of Adrien that had a genuinely good father end up handling his mother's 'death' so poorly that he's down to kill whoever gets in the way as a coping mechanism?

All of this might be rendered unnecessary anyway with the fact that they're working for whatever 'Supreme' that's actually the Big Bad and might be forcing them into this? I need more info on that before I give a verdict.

I thought Hesperia being 'Good' would be the hardest sell considering Season 4 and 5's insistence that his evil plans have been 15-ish years in the making(despite the finale's insistence that he's only 'evil' because he misses Emilie) especially since clearly said plans are still in place as Alt!Adrien exists and Emilie 'died' meaning they got the Peacock. But other than the above plothole of somehow Good!Gabriel let Adrien end up as Claw Noire, he seems fine.

There's a lot of missed opportunities where they're trying to show alternate universes but only focusing on a single one. Like again: give us an Into the Ladyverse. We appearently see them for a few seconds during a Scooby-Doo Chase Scene™ which is the biggest slap in the face.

Other than the fact that this entire special on a base premise shouldn't be possible due to all other episodes insisting that there is only One True Timeline and that if anything somehow diverges, Bunnyx will come and make sure everything goes exactly as she remembers it.

We have yet another round of mass murdering terrorist supervillains who are validated because 'oh they were sad' so it's okay that they committed horrific crimes that they don't feel any remorse for outside of a 'let me just say, from the bottom of my heart: my bad.' but they're now redeemed with no consequences. And I wouldn't even care /that/ much because like a little hypocritical coming from an MLP fan if it weren't for the fact that 1.) they feel no remorse whatsoever and 2.) we have the narrative constantly beating us over the head about how none of this applies to the one abused teenage girl who's acting out because of trauma despite not going full supervillain on her own terms just being a jerk to her classmates.

[frumfrumfroo]

I get tired of Zuko being brought up as the archetypal redemption arc (I get why people on the pro-redemption side do it, because he's a cultural touchstone for many people when we're kind of in dearth of villain redemptions, contrary to popular belief). But it's interesting how he lacks many of the elements I find engaging about redemption arcs, partly as a consequence of it being a children's show - Zuko can safely be redeemed because his daddy is the true baddie, so we still have the archetypal 'hero defeats villain' story; Zuko doesn't have a romance, and you can argue he's a villain protagonist in many ways, so the absolute product of his arc is kind of discrete; Azula (though apparently she was intended to be redeemed) still functions as a baddie for him to take down, so it's not like nonviolence is embedded in the narrative (which is what I personally find powerful) - and so on.

If I may add to your post, I definitely agree with you that it's a product of the current cultural/media climate, and comparisons to Zuko tend to not be productive. The anatomy of the fallout is little to do with the emotional arc or verisimilitude of the character's development, and so changing that isn't going to change anything. There are also elements like, Zuko gets to be the 'one' contrastive character who did it correctly - emotionally unbound in the story (his major redeeming relationship is with his uncle, even) - and for many people in the current discourse, from a time of childhood idealism. If I were to psychoanalyse these people, Kylo Ren, for instance, is so uncomfortable as a product of teenage narrative cynicism, maybe even worse because the Sequel Trilogy unearthed the OT. Zuko functions sort of like 'the one female character written correctly' which people bandy about to silence discussions of female character criticism or the presence of female characters, despite the fact this is an extremely limiting and antihumanistic approach (for black characters, for black female characters, for disabled characters, and so on - we want a variety). It's like how the 1:4 ratio of women to men is considered 'even'.

But I would go so far to say that why Zuko fails as a point of comparison is that many elements I view as powerful, moving, and challenging in redemption arcs are simply not there. This makes him feel safer. If Zuko is the 'limit', then you can suppress the discussion surrounding villain redemption arcs this way. Because romance isn't a feature, nonviolence isn't a conclusive feature, Azula can't be redeemed (she's truly crazy and evil), so redemption is a 'yea high' bar of disappointment. This is why I am tired of Zuko as a point of comparison bandied by the anti-redemption crowd, both because it stymies storytelling (there is no limit on what sorts of stories deserve to be told) but because it's actually kind of... not the same thing as what we're talking about. It doesn't go far enough. It barely does at all (and in anime, the villain redemptions tend to go pretty far, so what Avatar was playing off of was, well, playing it safe).

I also think it would be a different story if they had gone for Zuko/Katara with a female POV, but I don't really believe that both of those things were ever the intention. There's not really room for it in the Aang Show where the girl is a prize. But I'm not sure that many would meditate on it with such content if romance were involved at all. Hell, even now there are people who insist that Vader's redemption wasn't one at all because it commits too much - and that's why I think Zuko as an example persists.

I can't speak on the actual content because I was never in the fandom and haven't seen the show, but I'm sure you're right. I also think it's largely to do with these people having seen Zuko's arc when they were younger and it being 'grandfathered in'. As we see with some of the antis in sw fandom being totally fine with anidala or thinking Anakin is a sympathetic and tragic character, but lose their shit at the suggestion Ben is intended the same way despite being a far, far less demanding example. Even though anidala actually was an abusive relationship and reylo is not. etc.

Because they grew up with it and have already accepted the story's conclusion, they retrofit the 'good' and 'hero' labels and are thus fine with Anakin's redemption. The label is more important than any action he could take, because these people are working from an indelible label-based 'morality'. It's a form of Protagonist Centred Morality.

And I'm confident the same is true of A:TLAB.

And yes, there's also the fact that it's apparently an extremely tame and not very challenging redemption, because it's a show for little kids and thus Zuko doesn't kill anyone or do anything that violent. And again, I haven't seen it, but I get the impression he was always at least a bit sympathetic? So you never saw him as a simple and unrepentant villain. I could be wrong about that idk.

It is an extremely annoying thing that people still trot this out as the 'one acceptable redemption arc for all fiction ever', but that attitude has nothing to do with the writing of his arc or his character and everything to do with the people saying this and the circumstances under which they were exposed to him. And it's a self-fulfilling prophecy at this point because he's been given the pass, so even people coming to the show later already have permission to like him and won't respond to him the way they would otherwise.

The anti echo chamber will keep perpetuating this.

[gojuo]

Tell us now your top 5 most hated characters on ASOAIF and F&B please!

My no.1 most hated ASOIAF character is Tywin Lannister. I hate this man. I hate him very much. I wish he would go away and die somewhere where he will inconvenience no one but the vultures. I loathe his manner. I loathe his style. I loathe the fact that he dares draw breath in a world where my loved ones do not or rather cannot because he murdered them. I loathe that he was rewarded for behavior which, in-universe, he should have been quartered for. I want him dead. I want to kill him and destroy him. I want him died. #SCENE #ANGER #FUCK #DIE #HATERED

There is not a single ounce — not even a miniscule amount ­— of sympathy I have for this scumbag. Not a single thing likeable about him. Not a single redeeming quality he has to his name. From the first moment he showed up on page until the very last mention of him, he was nothing short of disgusting. He is diabolical, satanic, monstrous, loathsome, ghoulish, sadistic, cruel, insert every single synonym of the term demonic here, etc. etc. I hate him. I hate him I hate him I hate him I hate him.

The whole “Yeah he’s evil uwu but Charles Dance is so granddaddy I can fix him <3" sales pitch this low IQ fandom has been pushing since the dawn of that accursed adaptation on top of it all only makes the intense disgust I hold for him so much fucking worse. Tywin Lannister has no conscience, no charisma, no morals, and he has no honor — all of that in an un-sexy way, one of the greatest crimes a villain with no traumatic backstory could objectively ever commit. Never mind the beyond immoral execution of the Red Wedding (“Machiavellian” my ass. Any stupid fool who says this crap needs to go back to elementary school in order to relearn how to read and how to interpret literature and themes in literature right the fuck now), never mind the severe mental torture he’s put his own flesh and blood through to the point where two of them are in a destructive incestuous relationship with each other and the other pushed to the point of patricide, this monster had his son's fourteen-year-old little child-wife gangraped by his guards, had each of them give her a silver coin after one was done with her, then had thirteen-year-old Tyrion rape her last and, contrary to the others, give her a gold coin because “Lannisters are worth more”. All because she was a common-born little girl who dared to marry the disabled son he hated so much. Am I supposed to think this piece of shit falls under the sexy evil category of villains? What sad backstory does this trash have to his name that would woobify him enough to “if villain bad why sexy” him? His father had a few mistresses after his mother died and gave them gifts and cared for them? Was that the tragic past of his that elevated him enough for people to wash their conscience clean so to cross moral boundaries all to lust after this so-called “sexy villain”? Tywin Lannister had his father’s mistress, who was nothing but a poor common-born daughter of a candle-maker, stripped naked and paraded through the streets of Lannisport for two whole goddamn weeks, and forced her to tell every man she came across that she was a thief and a whore, quite alike to what he did to Tysha as well. This man hates women. I cannot stress this enough, like Tywin Lannister hates women. And not just women, but especially commoner women. His modus operandi is inflicting sadistic sexual violence on any and all women he doesn’t like (which is like, all of them). As a true “if villain bad then why sexy” connoisseur and quite frankly, the president of the club, this man is not, never was and never will be a part of that esteemed category of villains.

And you know something that’s a veeery personal ick of mine — and this is really the icing on the cake for me — is shit-for-brains dickriders of this ghoul having the gall to pretend like he did not explicitly order the murder of Elia and her babies, that he apparently just “let” Clegane and Lorch loose on them. These low IQ fucks know what that demon did to his father’s poor mistress and what he did to little Tysha, and then somehow they still think this sadist with a severely fragile ego did not tell Clegane and Lorch to do what they did to her with his own mouth? Any waste-of-space who parrots this BNF-drivel (all said in order to minimize what happened to Elia, Rhaenys and the baby in place for Aegon) is not only going on my blocklist like immediately, they also need to die. Respectfully.

Now, I mostly spoke on his character from a moral standpoint, but I want to make clear that this loser’s shortcomings aren’t only morality-based. All the shit-for-brains stans this demon has know he has no morals so they always deflect to the “b-b-but he’s a military genius, that’s why I like him, I’m so edgy!!!” excuse and I want to emphasize how fucking stupid you have to be to believe Tywin is anything but brainless. AFFC is literally right there. GRRM’s explicitly spells out to the reader through Jaime’s POV how fucking stupid Tywin was in everything that he did. How the only show of military genius this demon had was through being nothing but a bully. All his work unraveled the second he died. He built nothing, and he will go down in history as nothing. That’s why his one and only legacy will always be that he got murdered on the shitter by his own son, like the fucking loser that he is.

I hate this fucking character with every fiber of my being.

On number 2 stands Aerys II Targeryen. Do I even need to explain this? What I said about Tywin applies to this racist, rapist, fascist piece of shit as well. I’m not going to waste my time and money psychoanalyzing this bottom-of-the-barrel trash. Aerys is the pinnacular culmination of three hundred years of Targaryen delusion, self-worship, egotism and five thousand years of Valyrian hubris, god-complex, and megalomania. Him and his daughter both, but I’ll get to her in a minute. This man’s lucky he’s only got 2 stans — and those two are only stanning just to be contrarians — unlike Tywin, who’s got an actual dedicated fanbase. Ugh. Two peas in a pod. One edge he has over Tywin is that at the very least Aerys has some sort of tragic backstory that’s actually valid. Too bad for him idgaf. Pour one out for Rhaella :(

My third most hated is ... Daenerys. Man… How do I even open this can of worms… I’ve a whole tag dedicated to hating her, soooo awkwardly waves hand in that direction. Everything about Daenerys is just so … racist. Racist on an in-universe level, racist on a meta level and racist on a fandom level, so I was never going to like Daenerys no matter what. The fact that she has the most insane and delusional and downright disgusting fanbase ever in all of media history really doesn’t help her case. If they hadn’t been this rabid and racist, then I don’t think I would have hated her this much. Because then I could’ve just had her character be as she is: the Paul Astreides of the series. A false Messiah, basically. The meta-level racism (GRRM making every single antagonist in her plotline nothing but walking, talking Reel Bad Arabs tropes; the use of POV trap which leads to none of the brown and black supporting characters in her story having a voice; GRRM’s own racism as in exotic-erotic tropes for all of the Essosi people, really badly researched POC cultures he based the Essosi off of, using brown and black people as nothing but props for the main white girl) and Daenerys’ in-universe racism (conquering and colonizing lands and peoples; white saviorism; imperialism; her hypocritical use of slavery) would still be there, of course, and I still would not have been able to stomach it meaning I still would not have rooted for her in any way, but then at the very least I would not have been subjected to a long decade of fandom racism being justified through the excuse of her freeing slaves from evil Reel Bad Arabs (spoiler alert: she is not freeing anybody).

Ugh, I don’t wanna talk about her. Everything about her from her character to the plot and storyline and her place in the narrative is downright insulting to me as a WOC, and quite frankly, any WOC that lays down their lives to defend this girl baffles me. Like, stop it. Please have some self-respect.

Then comes Jaehaerys the Old King. Father and inventor of misogyny. It���s crazy.

No. 5 is Rhaenys I and Daeron I the Young Dragon. EVERY TONGUE THAT RISES AGAINST THE DORNISH SHALL FALL!!!

[haleigh-sloth]

I feel kinda weird when people are like "Shigaraki is a grown adult and needs to be held accountable even if you feel bad for his child self". Not in a poor little meow meow way. People need to take accountability for causing harm even when it's a result of mental illness. But the manga has always been clear that he didn't develop right? Like it's weird to expect him to shake off years of grooming when he hit 18. This is difficult to put into words without sounding like I am making excuses lol

I mean, you really don't even have to make excuses for him. The story is working toward forgiving him pretty blatantly without the excuses.

It's a story. A story exists to explore ideas. A story like BNHA explores ideas that are based off of our reality, but because of the sheer fact that it is a fantasy story, the exploration of those ideas will be quite exaggerated, and in turn, unrealistic.

That's why when people say shit like "He should be held accountable for his actions", I just eye roll. They're wanting a realistic telling of how criminals we are familiar with are treated. And to that I say--find something else to read, because you don't deserve the story for what it is.

In our reality, there is no real way to "redeem" oneself after ending other peoples' lives. I mean, no there just isn't. But in fiction ideas are exaggerated.

In FMA Scar murdered like...close to 40, if not 40+ people in a fucking military state country that committed genocide against his race. Scar helped save the country from demise, and then was offered a position to help the military that massacred his people. And then that same military started working to rebuild his country, just like that. Would Scar face the same fate in our reality? Fucking no. But it's a story that explores the idea of what certain situations DO to a person, what it can lead a person to do.

Now let's apply that to Shigaraki.

Gonna repeat myself--they're wanting a realistic telling of how criminals we are familiar with are treated.

Shigaraki has killed many many maaaanyyyyy people. Oof, so many. Pretty bad, yeah?

But Shigaraki's position in BNHA is a challenge to the main character to deliver a certain theme that the story has centered itself around. And with that, what has Shigaraki personally done to the main character? Not really much. Bakugo doesn't count, because for one: Bakugo isn't even gonna stay dead, but for two: it's not even Shigaraki specifically who is responsible right now. And no I don't mean fighting. That's circumstantial with them being a hero and a villain.

What I'm getting at is that Shigaraki's character, his arc, and his actions were all constructed a very specific way so that a different character could deliver the themes of the story hand in hand with Shigaraki at a certain level of ease. I say that because it doesn't have to be realistic. It needs to be convincing.

Realistically, Shigaraki would have been killed, detained, what the fuck ever. There'd be no happy ending in sight. He's done.

But this is BNHA, where the notion of a true hero exists, and such an idea is based around saving someone's existence in every way. It's an exaggerated idea that you won't ever see in your lifetime, in our reality. But in a story that wants to explore the idea of saving someone no matter what, because that someone is in pain and they as a human being matter, these ideas are convincing.

Yeah mental illness is not an excuse for harming someone. God fucking bless, I have been living this statement every day at my job currently. But that's not what the story is asking you to consider.

It's asking you to consider if Shigaraki is worth saving behind the monstrous cover he is wearing right now, because deep down he isn't a monster. He's just a person who is feeling anything and everything in the worst way.

The realistic aspects that you're talking about --I would say Horikoshi utilized very realistic trauma reactions to make the character convincing.

But imo the whole "he didn't develop right" argument is kinda moot, cuz that's not the question the story is asking. That's just the realistic part of the character that makes the resolution the story is building up toward (saving regardless of actions) convincing.

Realistic things can be used to make a character and a story convincing. But a story does not have to portray realism to be convincing. It just needs to follow up on the ideas it put in place.

For BNHA, if Izuku saves Shigaraki with the same mindset that he used to save Bakugo, Shouto, Iida, Kota, and Eri---then it's convincing. Because that's an idea about Izuku's character that has been implanted since chapter one.

Izuku saving Shigaraki after all the mass murder and destruction is not realistic by any means.

But because of the way Shigaraki's character has been constructed (a mess of emotions that makes it impossible for him to say what he really wants--which is for a hero to save him) and the way Izuku's character has been constructed (a hero who decides to save someone without them asking for it), it will be convincing.

You can make excuses but tbh, you don't need to. It's not necessary imo.

[kitkatopinions]

If neo gets a redemption arc it will be way worst than emeralds as there was practically no build up beforehand for it at least emerald had some hints she doesn't want to be evil

So to be honest, Neo was one of the characters I singled out in the first few seasons of rwby as the most likely to be able to be redeemed along with Torchwick, Emerald, and Mercury (and Adam, but I'm not touching that conversation atm.)

Because villain redemption arcs don't always look like "I no longer want to be evil anymore" to "I no longer am evil." They often look like "The thing I'm doing no longer benefits me" to "Now I have friends I want to look out for" to "Now I no longer want to be evil."

The "We're making a new world" people are Watts, Hazel, Cinder. The "We want to destroy the world" people are Salem and Tyrian. Meanwhile, Roman is a vicious thief, but one who is out to survive and has a 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em' mentality. That's easily turned towards a 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend' thing where if he'd realized that Salem was the true threat to him and Neo, he could've aligned himself with the heroes for the sake of convenience, and then eventually developed relationships and eventually wound up starting to naturally change for the better (in my own fanfics, I add onto this possibility by giving him a tragic backstory that includes an ex-friendship with some of the adults and a passive semblance that fucked with his head.) Neo would go with Roman in a redemption arc, but prior to this 'gets possessed by the Cat' thing, post-Roman's-death, Neo has been entirely hellbent on revenge against the wrong person, meaning that if people had managed to talk sense into her (made more possible by Cinder's betrayal) she could've shifted into 'still bad but now a wildcard that the group might feel like they have to work together with,' and for my part with how Ruby sometimes seems a little Torchwick-ish, I always felt like Neo could develop a messed up devotion based on seeing Torchwick in her and therefore projecting Torchwick onto her, and then eventually that could lead to an actual slow burning redemption.

Meanwhile, Mercury is explicitly going wherever the wind takes him more or less and I also think that since he was raised to be an assassin by an abusive horrible father and then immediately got brought into Cinder's team and therefore Salem's (when we know both Cinder and Salem are abusive to their underlings) I always figured that Mercury didn't know much outside of violence, and if he was given a chance, he'd be able to slowly come around. And Emerald is obvious, she's the one who actually almost felt sad about Beacon and then doubted their actions later in Volume six. Her motivations were tied to Cinder, so imo the obstacle for her starting in on her redemption was just removing Cinder either by death or by having Emerald realize Cinder didn't care about her. This is actually one reason why I think her redemption was badly handled, Emerald's devotion to Cinder was really built up and even included in the very volume Em switched sides in, but didn't play any real part in her choice to leave and instead Emerald pretty much just left entirely out of self-preservation. But, her redemption was really likely from jump.

But yeah, I think that as far as redemption goes, I don't just look at 'who seems like they might not actually want to be evil,' I tend to look at things like 'who has a lot to lose,' 'who has motivations that might be easily swayed,' 'who seems like they might not be happy with their life as is,' 'is this person committed to a nefarious goal or is their involvement more by chance?' That kind of thing.

It's like, some redemptions are Zuko in ATLA, by the time he left his father for the last time to join the heroes group, he had completely seen the error of his ways and wanted nothing more than to help others and save the world. Then there are other redemptions that are like Michael in the Good Place, when he joined the group he was still a massive jerk doing bad things for fun, he just also wanted to fry a bigger fish and allied himself with the humans to do it, and it took time to get him from there to 'these guys are my friends and I want them to be safe' to him talking ethics and giving speeches about how humans can always get better while he tried to save the world.

In the longest running (non-published) AU rwby fic I have that my sis and I did after being disappointed in volume 6, Torchwick, Emerald, Mercury, and Neo all more or less got redeemed together - Roman survived the Beacon attack and was trying to seek out Cinder to find out what happened to Neo, who had been captured by Salem, and he ran into Mercury and Emerald who had just run away after the Haven attack (where Cinder actually did die and Emerald became the Fall Maiden) and they joined up with Roman in his quest to join up with Ruby's group because Emerald wanted revenge on Salem for Cinder's sake. And then while they had joined the good side, they consistently got into hateful arguments and Mercury kept talking about ditching, and eventually they managed to free Neo, who stayed 'on the good side' for Roman's sake while continuously trying to convince him to ditch but at this point the semblance I'd given Roman (which is survival) had made it so he felt like he had to stay with Ruby's group because it was the best way to survive. And only after a grueling year-long adventure filled with turmoil, trauma, spending tons of time with the good guys, some of them getting captured by Salem again, temporarily losing their semblances, encountering a Grimm similar to Apathy only it made everyone angry rather than apathetic so they all got into a huge fight where stuff got addressed... Only after all of that did they actually fully really change, and even then, Neo specifically took longer than the others to really change because she took awhile to stop being jealous that Torchwick cared about people other than her and was prioritizing saving the world over just taking care of her. It was a lot of fun! But yeah, I think this post was way way way too long just to say 'actually I think Neo could've been redeemed before getting possessed by the Cat.' XD

[hanitje]

Christian Cage: Heels Have To Be OK With Being Hated For It To Really Work

Christian Cage knows you can’t half-ass being a heel for it to truly resonate.

Cage has been a dastardly heel in All Elite Wrestling. He has repeatedly taken shots at “Jungle Boy” Jack Perry’s late father (Luke Perry) in a number of promos, and he even referenced Arn Anderson’s son Barrett, who recently passed away. Cage has made it clear that nothing is off limits, and this mindset has helped him become one of the most detested villains in AEW.

Christian Cage described his mindset about being a heel. He detailed how he thought a heel needs to believe what they are saying. The veteran stated that the performer has to go all in and ensure the character doesn’t have redeeming qualities.

“I think, as a heel, when you’re delivering your message, you have to have a nugget of truth, and you embellish it, and you believe what you’re saying, and you believe it with every ounce of your being, for you, that’s true, and you’re right, and you’re justified, even though it’s probably wrong. That’s how I look at it. When it comes to my character, especially these days, the turtleneck guy, zero redeemable qualities, but he can go out and say and do things that Jay Reso would never go say and do. In that respect, you have to have full commitment to it for it to really work. You have to be okay with being hated for it to really work. You can’t be on the fence like, ‘Ah, these few people are booing me and it kind of bothered me.’ No, you have to be all in. You have to make sure everybody hates you.” 

When asked whether he worries about the backlash for what he does as a heel, Christan Cage stated that his job is to get heat. He detailed how it’s possible to infuriate the audience with mannerisms or pauses, and he pointed to a recent example. The veteran also made it clear that, as a heel, you have to be okay with being hated.

“I go out there to get heat. That’s my job, to go out there and to get heat. But I think also, you can get that kind of heat, even with just your mannerisms, pauses, and timing, the way you stop,” he explained. “If you just even give a glance to the audience in a certain way, or if they’re trying to get under your skin, where they’re reacting, and you just keep talking through their noise.

“A lot of times, that elevates the heat, if you just keep talking. You’re not even acknowledging the fact that they’re booing you this loud. Now they will even try to get louder and louder to try to drown you out. It just happened recently happened in Detroit a few weeks ago, it was very much that way. But that’s how I approach being a heel. Zero redeeming qualities. Just kinda go out there and understand that you gotta be okay with being hated.” 

[justatalkingface]

Hey 👋 I've seen your page and you're really indepth and accurate about bnha, really great analysis. Can I ask you where you think bnha is going as a series? Or like, what messages are trying to be pushed and if they're right or not? Because where we are now it's really hard to tell.

The heroes haven't really learned much about how things got this way, and even when they're told how the villains got where they are, the heroes (and the hero kids) don't really commit to (even attempt to) changing anything to make sure things don't wind up right back where the story is now.

Speaking specifically on the mutant plot you wrote that great critique on, shouji's answer of basically 'shine so bright it makes the racists feel bad' did not seem like a good sign for the future. can I ask how you feel about that part too?

An ask! My first ask! I didn't think I'd ever get an ask, actually. And! And it's a juicy one! Plenty to dig my teeth into here....

Where it's going is simple, yet complicated in a weird way. Where we are, now, Hori has finally decided on a direction and seems firmly attached to it, after zig zagging in messages and themes throughout the entire storyline, so in that sense, the end goal is clear. The problem is he took so long to make up his mind on what even wants that he left himself a giant pile of plot threads to deal with, and I am not only positive he can't resolve them all well, I'm not even sure he can even end them all, they're all so many and all over the place, and so much of it is deeper and complex that the story they're actually in.

This is the reason you're confused, by the way; all the themes, back stories and plot threads that Hori has just... decided to not use, are still there, he just left them hanging. Like Corrupt Heroes, when all the heroes we see are good, Endeavour, the lone asshole, is now defacto redeemed, and even the originally somewhat dubious Mt Lady, who was money obsessed, is fully on the straight and narrow. Everyone talks about 'corrupt heroes' (and acts like Stain has actual depth when what we have is flat out a two dimensional character) throughout the story but we never see them, because Hori realized he didn't actually want to get into how dark that would be. It's why Hawk was killed and replaced by New Hawks, and Deku (like my earlier post, I'm going to be putting a firm line between 'Izuku', and 'Deku', where Deku is a hollowed out version of Izuku, with all his defining traits scraped away to make room for power and The Plot, and Izuku is an actual human being with depth that we haven't seen a long time now) doesn't even blink at Lady Nagant's entire everything, before he revealed she was Good The Whole Time as he defeated her: because Hori abruptly changed directions and all the story build up before that point was suddenly retconned into nonexistence.

The direction Hori seems to have chosen, barring a last second 180, is what I call a 'True Shonen'; that is to say, he has committed fully to the themes of Friendship and Being A Good Person overcoming all obstacles, no matter how ludicrous the odds against it. The ending, then, will be Deku, maybe with some help, killing AFO and Saving The Day, and then Everything Is Better, probably with a timeskip to years later to show how much better everything has become. Now, in theory, that's not a bad thing. In practice, MHA is one of the most theoretically political shonen mangas I've ever seen, and until recently Hori has been trying to thread the line between a normal shonen plotline and the deep ideas and concepts he's introduced, and done that terribly, so there's a lot things that are going to happen that are going to be... awkward, to say the least.

In a True Shonen, for example, the Hero always wins. Not only that, when they reach the full potential of their powers at endgames like this? They get everything they want. Every goal is achieved, with only one or two token sacrifices, and some victories being symbolic or incomplete, and at worst the cost is just themselves. One of the places we're going to run into problems, though, is that Deku has committed to saving Shigaraki. And that is going to happen, Shigaraki will be saved, one way or another.

The problem is Shigaraki himself. Shigaraki was, at the point right before AFO stepped in to conveniently make him helpless and ripe for Deku to vibe on saving, utterly insane in a way I don't know the technical words to describe, but his goal is easy to name: omnicide.

Shigaraki was a fucked up man child that had never had a life, and didn't know how to be a person, until he went through the trials his mentor arranged for him to grow. When he finished and, for lack of a better word self actualized, he gained a goal that was all his for the first time.

That goal was to kill every living creature on the planet, destroy everything on the planet, until there was nothing left. Shigaraki's ideal endgame is a barren world of dust and ash, save for maybe five cities where Japan used to be that his friends live in. These cities have all their stuff, cute prey for Toga to hunt, and possibly some slaves to do things for them (though we're ignoring how that'd destroy all ability to make things like they'd want on a reasonable level, like clothes and food, but whatever), and that's about the only feature left on this bleak, empty world of grey.

Shigaraki has killed, at least, hundreds of people, and is at least indirectly involved in the deaths of thousands more. He has no idea how to live anything near to a normal life. Every one of his skills revolve around killing, or video games.

That is what Deku wants to save, because in the set up we're in, Shigaraki isn't the enemy anymore. He's the rival character, and he just happens to be possessed by the actual big bad. Picture Naruto trying to save Sasuke, if Sasuke was fully possessed by Orochimaru; that's the kind of energy that's happening here. Except, you know, it isn't. They're foils in many ways, but the set up for this kind of situation has never been a thing. That's where the 'kid' in Shigaraki came from, to explain this and skip over years of connections and build up that are sorely lacking to explain why Deku would want to save him.

Not even mentioning what the 'saving' would look like: maybe Shigaraki will go Darth Vader on AFO and mutual kill him, redeeming himself in the process. Maybe Deku will, and I'm not screwing with you, pull the fucking kid out of him, and that kid will just be innocent of Shigaraki's sins. Maybe it'll be like the last chapter of Naruto, where infamous traitor Orochimaru, famed for his human experimentation on orphans, and the ex-leader and founder of a hostile military state, is somehow in charge of the orphanage, and in the same way Shigaraki will just be magically reintegrated back into society somehow. Who knows?

This? This is just one problem with the end we're going towards, and there's plenty more beyond that. Dabi, for example, needs to be saved as well, to resolve Shoto's Endeavor's character arc. He can't just die, he can't just be locked in jail forever, he needs to come to some sort of peace with his family; the story will not end any other way. In it's own way, though, this is almost worse than the Kidaraki thing, since while Shigaraki was basiclly thrown into villainy, without any context on how not to do that, Dabi went willingly to his damnation, but it doesn't matter because it will happen.

So yeah, where we're going is easy. The ride there, though? Woo boy, that's going to be fun.

On the origins of villains and the complete refusal to deal with their causes? Yeah, that's another one of those big threads left to hang: MHA is a theoretically 'real' world, just with super powers in it, and that means it's complicated, and there's politics, and things don't work out for everyone. All of that? Yeah, that's a bunch of stuff Hori just... started ignoring a while ago, and at this point, i would bet actual money he never will really focus on again. Oh, Deku might make some lip service to it at a climatic moment with Shigaraki, and there's probably going to be a time skip with the problems 'solved' (and yet there'll be villains for new/old heroes to face dramatically anyways), but that's it. To realistically deal with the causes of villainy would require a lot of work on things like poverty, mental health, racism in general, and the insane amount of bystander syndrome in the setting, all of which are never happening beyond a surface level take.

Although, now that I mentioned it... man, Hori seems to hate civilians, doesn't he? I'm not really going anywhere with this, I just wanted to talk about that briefly, but the general public is always wrong in MHA, aren't they? Or, really just about anyone who isn't a hero or a villain is both useless and stupid. He uses 'the civilians' exclusively as props to push his message, usually by a hero explaining why what they're saying is dumb and bad, or as scapegoats to try and push the blame on, and it's just kinda weird isn't it?

And oh, the mutant plot. Oh, that response. Anon, you may not know this, but I loathe every part of that, and I would love to tell you why.

Let me sum up briefly his argument and explain why each part is wrong:

We start off with 'Don't be upset and act out about the discrimination you face, or your children will be next.' Like, I'm paraphrasing here, obviously, and equally obviously I'm slanting it negatively. Still, though the way I put it makes it sound like a threat, and maybe in some undertones it is, honestly the main reason this is shit is the fact that they're here means their children are being discriminated against, already. They aren't going to be in a giant mob following a villain, who is famously part of an organization that has destroyed several cities and killed who the fuck knows how many people, against law enforcement and the super law enforcement, unless they really, really think that this is their only way out. That, in the entire setting, with normal police, and the hero system that is loudly broadcasting that they will save you, the only person who is on their side, the only person who can possibly make change happen for them, is Spinner. These are people so trapped and cornered that they're trying to chew their metaphorical arms off to escape, and Shoji is saying there will be an 'escalation' of their situation that has to be a fact of life for them already.

This, somehow, along with city mutants (who according to their own words just a chapter or two ago are de facto living a different life than them and don't understand what it's like to be a country mutant) joining hands with normal humans, is enough to stop them, because.... they get to watch the people they know have it better than them demonstrate their lack of trauma?

Seriously, let me stop here a second. Let's ignore, for a minute, the sheer layers of stupid here, and take this as written: These people are desperate, and feel so abandoned by society that the only person they think is on their side is a villain. They follow him in siege on a hospital against a backdrop of heroes and police. Let's further pretend that this was, some the fuck how, a good argument. Would that even stop them? They're stuck now; they've come this far, in a something far beyond a riot, lead by a defacto enemy of the State. Just stopping it like this and leaving isn't going to make things go back to normal, it's not going to make them better, it's going to screw them over. The second they did this they were committed, because shonen logic aside, do you think law enforcement is going to forget this? Forgive this? Unless AFO wins, they haven't put their cause back by three years, they've fucked up by decades; every mutant is going to be viewed as a villain just hiding how sinister they are. The very act of doing this is tying them, ride or die, with AFO and the League, and burned the bridges behind them. They can't go back now.

Moving on, Shoji then says that, 'the reason you all gathered here, in a small army, isn't wrong, and the fact that you were able to operate beyond the level of a thoughtless animal and stop when I told you too makes it seem to me you were all shining like the fucking Luminescent Baby'. I shit you not, he compliments them on the fact they 'kept thinking'. I don't care what translation ends up official, I can't see any way anything that vein isn't insulting bullshit with the subtext of, 'The fact that you listened to me is why I think you kept thinking, and if you ignored me, you wouldn't be thinking'. Quite a fucking high horse you're on there, Shoji. Oh, and a token black hero then apologizes for being ignorant to their plight, which is just a special touch on top of everything else.

And now for the good part: "Let's use the fact that you're all Luminescent Babies to change the people hurting us! They'll look in awe of how you glow and be so embarrassed that they'll become better people out of shame!"

I'm going to dial back the snark here because this is the meat of the argument, along with the actual question asked to me (lol), and I want to seriously address how bad this is. What this argument is saying, basiclly, is to be perfect, take the high road, and you'll shame your abusers into no longer abusing you, into no longer being racist. In general, this kind of thing, a disadvantaged minority having to be better than their peers for approval, isn't new; this is old as fuck. What this does, all this does, is allow the person in question to keep their job against all the people who hate them and want them to stop getting above themselves. That doesn't solve anything, that is a step: the true change that they're talking about is long, and hard, and complicated. In fact, I can say in total confidence that historically, it is proven that doing this has not, in fact, magically stopped racism or sexism from being things that exist.

Seriously, Hori, what the fuck.

So, yeah, this is pure shit, basiclly. If this was actually how the world proceeded, off this logic, nothing would get better, but again, that logic isn't going to matter with how the story is going; things will be 'better' regardless of what the heroes actually do or don't do to fix the problem.

And... I think that's everything you asked, Anon. Thanks for the ask!

[twistedtummies2]

The Price May Be Right - Number 31

Welcome to “The Price May Be Right!” Starting today, I’m counting down My Top 31 Favorite Vincent Price Performances & Appearances! The countdown will cover movies, TV productions, and many more forms of media. Our countdown begins with Number 31: Sir Despard Murgatroyd, from Ruddigore.

I have to admit, the main reason this performance makes it onto the countdown has more to do with the production itself than Vincent or his work in it. I just really, REALLY want to talk about “Ruddigore.” Is that so wrong? I hope not. For those who don’t know already, “Ruddigore” is an operetta – a light opera – made by the famous duo of Gilbert & Sullivan. These two creative geniuses created arguably the best, and certainly the most popular, comic operettas in history; their works are typically regarded as the forerunners to modern musical theatre. While my favorite of their works is the ever-renowned “The Pirates of Penzance,” this somewhat lesser-known work of theirs is a close second. “Ruddigore” is, in a bizarre way, a sort of forefather to stories like “Wicked,” as it actually asks the same basic question as that show and explores the concept in its own unique fashion. That question, of course, is “Are people born wicked, or do they have wickedness thrust upon them?” Are people we regard as evil just naturally inclined to do bad things, or are they simply products of circumstances? Ruddigore plays with these themes in a way that is both poignant and totally absurd; it is, like most of Gilbert & Sullivan’s creations, a farcical comedy, but it has a darker tone and a slightly more complex message than most. The plot of the story focuses on the Murgatroyd Family: a long lineage of nobles in England who have long guarded the estate of Castle Ruddigore. Long ago, one of the Murgatroyds quite literally made a hobby out of burning witches (as you do). While most of his victims were innocent people, this hobby did come to bite him in the arse when one witch he chose to persecute turned out to be a REAL enchantress. Before her death, she cast a hex upon the Murgatroyd Family, declaring that all future Baronets of Ruddigore would be forced to commit a crime every single day of their lives upon inheriting the estate. If they do not, they will suffer fits of tortuous agony and die. This leads to a long line of Bad Baronets of Ruddigore, as this lifestyle quite literally transforms each inheritor into a stereotypical Moustache-Twirling Villain. It happens. The main character – Sir Ruthven Murgatroyd, a.k.a. Robin (please hide all your Dick Graysons) – is the rightful heir to the castle. He is also a naïve and sweethearted young lad who has absolutely no desire to do evil and become the next Bad Baronet. This is where Sir Despard enters the picture: he is Ruthven’s younger brother, but when the fellow fakes his death and goes into hiding, becoming the humble gentleman Robin, Despard is forced to take the role of the next Bad Baronet. Despard is thus forced to abandon his fiancé – who goes mad from the loss – and commit numerous crimes, leading to him become a despised and physically ghoulish figure. It is only when Robin’s true identity is revealed that Despard is able to find a way to abandon this lifestyle and return to his beloved. The story is a mockery of typical Victorian melodramas: in here, the main character is both a handsome young man AND a moustache-twirling nasty. Despard, meanwhile, at first plays the role of the moustache-twirling bad guy, but eventually is redeemed. The damsel who gets embroiled in all this is never in any REAL distress, and – very ironically – the real bad guy of the story turns out to be the character who, in other tales, would typically be the hero. That role goes to Richard Dauntless: a sailor who at first starts off as Robin’s best friend, practically a brother to him…but when he falls in love with the same woman Ruthven does, he conspires with Despard to take the lady for himself. I absolutely love Ruddigore’s story and its sense of style. It’s a delightfully dark and Gothic comedy with some deep themes that lie beneath its completely silly surface. Really, my only problem with the play is it’s completely redonculuous ending, but…eh. It’s a comedic farce filled to the brim with patter songs, I wasn’t expecting a Shakespearean conclusion. :P Now that I’ve jabbered about that for so long…let’s get to Vincent himself. Vincent played the role of Despard in a TV production made for the 1980s. It was part of a series of televised productions of Gilbert & Sullivan’s plays, all of which featured a mixture of opera-trained theatre performers, mixed in with bigger-named screen actors to sort of draw in crowds. Vincent was a perfect choice to play some role in this story, as the show does have a wonderfully spooky and decadent atmosphere. Price had also done some musicals before this, both onstage and onscreen, so one would expect him to have the chops needed. To Vincent’s credit, he gives it his all, as he always did; there’s a wonderful, ironic charm to the way he plays Despard, especially in his more villainous mode, which contrasts delightfully with his more mild-mannered and somewhat persnickety persona when he is allowed to reform. However, as much as I love Ruddigore – and I love seeing Vincent in it – it’s a little hard for me to buy Despard as Robin’s YOUNGER brother in this film, considering the actor playing Robin – Keith Mitchell - was twenty whole years Vincent’s junior at the time, and he looked it. Also, Vincent’s voice is actually not as strong here as you might expect: while Price did have some musical training, the mixture of age and a constant smoking habit weakened his vocals over time, and you can definitely hear it in Ruddigore. It’s not necessarily bad, and he acts his heart out to make up for it, but when you compare it to virtually everybody else in the cast, it’s an obvious weak spot. Tomorrow, the countdown continues with my pick for Number 30!

[theanimeview]

Arcane Family Dynamics: Silco and Jinx

Source: Episode 4, Arcane

By: Beata Garrett | @zhongxia246

Welcome to Part Two of my analysis on Netflix’s original animated show, Arcane. You can read Part One of “Arcane Family Dynamics” here if you’re interested: theanimeview.com/2022/04/27/arcane-family-dynamics-vander-and-vi/

Part Two focuses on the other integral father-daughter relationship in the series, that of a grown-up Powder, who goes by Jinx now, and Silco. It’s a tragic and complicated relationship about two people projecting onto each other. For Jinx, Silco is a father figure who has replaced Vander and Vi in her life, guiding her and mentoring her in the way that they might have if they were able to. For Silco, he sees himself and Vander within the supposed betrayal Vi committed against Jinx.

One of the things that makes the storytelling in Arcane so successful is its many parallels between multiple characters. Silco begins the show as a one-dimensional villain and there’s also no question that he remains an antagonist as we see that his love for Jinx neither redeems him nor makes him more empathetic towards other people, including other families.

Jinx and Silco’s relationship begins in Episode 3 as they hug one another in the ruins of a building where Vander has just died. Years later, we see how both of them have been forged in their reactions to the betrayal of those considered their family. While we’re not shown exactly what happened in the years that Silco raised Jinx, we’re given a taste in the way he speaks to her and protects her from everybody else. There is a possibility for unconditional acceptance and love there and there’s an argument to make that Silco does actually offer Jinx unconditional love in a way Vi can’t. However, I believe that, for most of the series, Silco only wants a Jinx that he understands and one that mirrors him.

Source: Episode 4, Arcane

Episode 4 and 5 show just how close the two have become. In Episode 4, Jinx messes up during a mission and accidentally destroys the cargo that Silco’s group were smuggling when she hallucinates her sister. She demonstrates no remorse about this and smirks at Sevika, Silco’s right-hand woman, because she knows that Silco is always willing to clean up after her. Sevika sacrificed an arm for SIlco but it’s pretty clear that he has no loyalty towards her. When Sevika recounts this event to Silco, she tells him, “She fired on us” to which Silco dismissively replies that “There are always mishaps in battle” (Episode 4).

It’s also shown that this isn’t the first time it’s happened as others throughout the series point out that Jinx is becoming progressively unstable. It’s interesting to note that Silco’s consistent choice to ignore Jinx’s behavior and instability directly contradicts Vander’s style of parenting. Vander made sure to impress the nature of a leader’s responsibility upon Vi and to remind her that her actions ripple and affect everyone else in the vicinity. While Vander protected his kids by making sure they understood the consequences and world they lived in, Silco protects Jinx by covering up her mistakes.

Despite Jinx’s blunders, Silco continues to demonstrate unshakeable trust in her and even tells her “You’re the only one I can trust with this, Jinx” (Episode 5). This trust is underscored by how Silco always seems calm and composed when in front of others, but he reveals his concerns and true self to only Jinx. The meetings he has with various people under his control demonstrate this as he appears unbothered in front of characters like Marcus and Sevika but then turns immediately to Jinx, who’s always watching from the rafters, and tells her how he truly feels. She is his confidante and the only person he can show any kind of vulnerability to, which makes him overly dependent and overprotective of her.

Source: Episode 5, Arcane

There is perhaps no scene better to showcase Jinx and Silco’s relationship to one another than the river baptism scene. In Episode 5, Silco brings Jinx to the river where Vander almost killed him and gives her a symbolic cleansing reminiscent of a baptism. He tells her “Jinx is perfect,” a phrase that will come up again in Episode 9 when he dies, and “You need to let Powder die. So the fear of pain will no longer control you.”

Silco isn’t talking about any kind of pain either, but emotional pain, specifically that of betrayal. Jinx had just confided to him that she messed up the mission because she hallucinated Vi so Silco is attempting to make Vi meaningless to her. He wants her to rid herself of any attachment to her old family, that which Powder was part of, to become more like him.

Conflicted Loyalties

Unfortunately for Silco, Powder is not entirely gone and Vi’s return to Zaun complicates matters for his relationship with Jinx. After being broken out of jail so she can help Caitlyn, Vi sets out to find her sister again. In Vi’s mind, her sister has been kidnapped by Silco and is suffering under him or is even dead. She finds Sevika and fights her, demanding to know where Silco is “keeping” her sister. Sevika responds that Jinx works for Silco and that “She’s like his daughter” (Episode 5). 

When Vi actually meets Jinx for the first time in years and is promptly taken from her again, she realizes that her sister isn’t quite the same. Everyone around her, including another childhood friend of both Powder and Vi, tell Vi that her sister is unstable. The childhood friend, Ekko, even says, “Powder’s gone, Vi. All that’s left is Jinx and she belongs to Silco” (Episode 7).

On Silco’s end, he’s disturbed by the news that Vi is alive and has returned. Silco sees Vi as a threat not physically or politically in the same way that someone like Jayce is, but even more personally as a threat to his standing with Jinx. He knows what power Vi holds and he’s right to be scared of her swaying her sister. Silco understands that Vi represents hope and that Jinx may want to reconcile with her sister, partly because, as I like toI believe, he felt the same way with Vander.

We see Jinx being torn between family, the one that “betrayed” her and hasn’t been with her for years and the one that has been there all along, but which killed her father. This is visually symbolized by pivotal shots of Jinx against the sky or heading to higher ground in some way, such as when she shoots the flare that Vi gave her as a child, and her at the river with Silco, who’s associated with the deep, dark river where his current self was formed.

Jinx’s conflicted loyalties are also shown in how Vi and Silco approach her and what both offer. Vi sees her as Powder, as the child that she saw her last as, and offers her a chance to return to those times when she was more innocent. Silco offers her acceptance for who she is now, including all of the terrible things that she’s done (that he pushed her towards, undoubtedly), and a deep emotional understanding based on the trauma both of them have been through.

Fractured Sight

Source: Episode 7, Arcane

Another important visual symbol for Silco’s relationship with Jinx are eyes. Throughout Episode 4 to 7, we see that Silco needs to inject shimmer into his eye to either lessen the pain or keep the infection at bay. He trusts Jinx to administer it whereas, in Episode 1, we saw him injecting himself with it. This shows the intimacy between the two and how that intimacy can be used against one another as a form of punishment. After Jinx finds out that Vi is alive and that Silco lied to her, she punishes Silco with the medication syringe. As they talk and Silco eventually calms her down, it says a lot that Silco doesn’t resist even though his hands are unbound. It’s as if he understands that this is how she’s punishing him and that he accepts it.

There’s also the idea that neither Jinx nor Silco can see the full truth of the “betrayal” that happened to them and that this is reflected in Silco’s infected eye and Jinx progressively being shown with one eye as her hallucinations become more violent and stronger. In Episode 7, the mirror she’s looking at herself in fractures as she’s torn between deciding whether Vi is truly back for her or setting her up to be arrested.

Source: Episode 7 (top), Episode 1 (bottom), Arcane

After Jinx almost dies and has to be saved through a painful surgery requiring shimmer, her eyes begin to glow in a way that’s reminiscent of Silco. During the surgery, Jinx hallucinates that Caitlyn is the one actually hurting her while Vi watches. She’s unable to trust her sister, in no part thanks to Silco’s insistence that only he is her family, and ultimately forces Vi to choose either her or Caitlyn. Up to this point, there may still have been some hope to make Jinx understand that she still had a future with Vi and that she didn’t have to follow in Silco’s path.

Nothing So Undoing as a Daughter

Source: Episode 9, Arcane

Everyone in Arcane that has a family is vulnerable. In Episode 6, Silco threatens Marcus’s daughter after finding out that Marcus didn’t kill Vi as promised. The encounter just lampshades his own relationship with Jinx and how the same vulnerability he’s using to control Marcus is also one he’s not quite able to see within himself yet. Silco is very good at prying into the weaknesses of people but doesn’t know his own.

This is shown in how Silco’s focus on making Zaun independent shifts to protecting Jinx at all costs. At one point, Silco says, “I’m doing this for us, Jinx. All of us” (Episode 4). This use of “us” is fascinating as it comes up a few times when Silco is reassuring Jinx. While he initially means all of Zaun by the “us” used here, it becomes clear that he sees himself and Jinx as even more separate, as them against the world.

Near the end, Silco is rightfully called out by his fellow leaders for preaching loyalty to others about “sacrificing for the cause” (Episode 9) when he’s unwilling to reprimand Jinx in any way. When Silco actually makes a deal with Jayce to allow Zaun to function as an independent nation, he’s willing to do everything Jayce asks for until he tells Silco that Jinx needs to be handed over to pay for her crimes.

This mirrors Vander’s own dilemma in the first three episodes. Silco even talks to Vander’s statue and connects with the man for the first time in a while, saying, “Is there anything so undoing as a daughter?” (Episode 9). This is right after we see Silco being scared for another person for the first time as Jinx undergoes her surgery so it’s made even more obvious that he genuinely cares for her. What follows is the most tragic episode of Arcane besides that of Episode 3.

Source: Episode 9, Arcane

Throughout Arcane, everyone says, “[Jinx’s] like his daughter” but Silco never acknowledges it until Episode 9, the finale. During this episode, Jinx betrays Silco because she thinks he’s planning to hand her over to Piltover and shoots him when the sound of him pulling out a gun to kill Vi triggers her. It’s one of the most devastating scenes in the show as Jinx immediately regrets it and rushes to him, crying.

At this point, Vi has demonstrated a level of care for Caitlyn that Jinx didn’t want to see and Jinx has realized that Vi is a different person than the sister that would always put her first. She wants unconditional love and isn’t sure how to regulate the idea that someone could care for multiple people. In the end, Silco gives her the kind of love and acceptance she’s looking for as he tells her “You’re perfect.” I find it very important that he didn’t say, “Jinx is perfect” like he did in Episode 5. In his final moments, I believe Silco saw her in her full entirety, as both Jinx and Powder, and did accept all of her.

Source: Episode 9, Arcane

Silco’s death is the second death of her family that Jinx has been directly responsible for, and we see the immediate effects of it on her. Without saying anything, she chooses to sit in the “Jinx” chair, an action that directly rejects Powder and, by extension, Vi.

Throughout the season, Jinx has been working on an ultimate weapon for Silco. She finishes the weapon by the final episode but the irony is that Jinx herself is a weapon.

In the finale, she solidifies herself as Silco’s daughter and his legacy. Silco’s voice and words are the last dialogue we hear this season as Jinx remembers the first words he spoke to her in Episode 3: “We will show them all.” Remembering these words and choosing to shoot the weapon at Piltover while thinking of her first meeting with Silco is a sort of homage to him. There is no doubt that Silco was a father to her and the only person that understood the deepest, darkest parts of her. Jinx doesn’t choose to hurt Caitlyn or Vi in this moment, but chooses to finish the job Silco gave to her.

Source: Episode 9, Arcane

There are many things I love about Arcane, but the character of Silco and his relationship with Jinx is probably my favorite. The show tells us so much about their influence over one another through visual cues and the ways in which they react to the events around them. These are two characters that deeply bonded over shared trauma and Silco, while he did offer Jinx a kind of love, also worsened her fear of pain. As much as he tried to erase this fear for both of them, the two remained tied together by the fear of more betrayal, this time from each other.

What I love most are those genuine moments of tenderness between the two, like Silco keeping a mug Jinx made for him at his desk or Jinx hugging him in Episode 4. These are moments we don’t even see from Vander when he’s with Jinx and humanizes Silco beyond the typical antagonist. For better and worse, Silco was Jinx’s father and it undid them both.

[butwhatifidothis]

"Why does the context that makes this event look horrible matter? Just take it at face value and never use or gather any information from the other routes. Only information on CF matters when talking about things." Why are Edelstans like this?

It's an attempt to make it to where Edelboo totally isn't the villain - no, see, on every single other route in the game EdeIgard is absolutely nothing like she is on CF! Forget that neither of the other lords or Rhea have this apply to them, and that the routes that aren't their focus have them manifest aspects of their personality in different ways than their focus route does (for better or worse) for them - that doesn't apply to Edelgard! Without Byleth's guidance she is TOTALLY COMEPLTELY NOTHING LIKE SHE IS and anything off of her route shouldn't be taken into account when analyzing her!

Like, to an extent I get it, right? Cuz like, while Dimitri isn't not Dimitri on non-AM routes, it's undeniable that the fullest feel for his character is the one we get on his route. Same with Claude and VW, and Rhea and (the end of) SS. So like, yeah, sure, the best and fullest feel we can get for Edelgard would be on CF.

You know.

The route where she explicitly says that she wants to eliminate the Church, Kingdom, and Alliance.

And wants to make complete Imperial control of Fodlan a reality.

And lies about the Church blowing up Arianrhod and never comes clean.

And calls Nabateans creatures that merely masquerade as human.

And says that Rhea's "true self" (the Immaculate One, as in the form she can take specifically because she is Nabatean) is a "cruel beast."

And calls Nabateans something that has "plagued humanity."

As well as monsters.

And vile.

And, being generous, ignorantly calls a genocide a "simple dispute."

And proposes that Rhea and her family controlled Fodlan and humanity after killing Nemesis.

And can never spare any Nabatean in battle, unlike Byleth.

And says that she wants to kill Rhea and the Nabateans (more explicitly, in the JPN ver.), regardless of whether Byleth sided with Rhea.

And rejoices in the fact that there are no more Nabateans in her S support.

And gives control of the Alliance over to Count Bergliez, an Imperial general, after she kills/forcefully exiles its leader - something that is said to have been planned beforehand.

And lets Thales collect the Alliance Relics.

And doesn't reprimand Hubert in any way for suggesting they use their own allies as hostages against the Kingdom forces.

And implicitly denies the notion that she's ever "unleashed atrocities upon the world."

And lies about giving Garreg Mach time to evacuate - yes, one can surmise this even from just playing CF. Shamir's report on the other routes is not needed.

And still uses Demonic Beasts.

And orders the death of her friends.

All of this. In just post timeskip. Likely isn’t even everything. Is almost completely what specifically Edelgard does/believes (and the rest being what she condones). And exactly 0% of which she ever grows out of doing/believing, or redeems herself from, or apologizes for, or feels regret for.

Which is possibly what fucks me up the most about this idea that "You should just look to CF for Edelgard's character" because, even ignoring how the other two lords + Rhea don't get this treatment, CF is where we learn most of the still very evil things Edelgard does or believes. At best, you knock off the fact that we know she knows who actually committed Duscur (as that's AM exclusive) and so this scene has no real impact on Edelgard specifically. Oh, and that she Totally Feels Super Bad for murdering all of these innocent people. For her war that she admits is meant to put Fodlan back under complete Imperial control. After we add on all of the other shit CF reveals about Edelgard. Oh yeah, so much better than the other routes!

And also, it's just objectively bad to get the lore of Fodlan from just CF, because Edelgard says that her loredumps were based on what’s passed down from emperor to emperor. So, you know. She got her information from her father. Her father who is hard-confirmed to have lied to Edelgard about shit before. Vs getting Fodlan’s lore from Rhea, someone who was literally there herself while the shit was happening. Which is more reliable: something that AT BEST came from a thousand year game of Imperial Telephone (and AT WORST came from flat out lies), or something that came from a direct witness of the events in question? The take is just, like.. bad, all around lol

[ironwoodprotectionsquad]

Not related to the recent anon drama, but just wanna talk.

I really don’t understand CRWBY.

In the end of Volune 6 (?), Tyrian was all like “If General Ironwood comes to his senses and calls upon aid from Vacuo, all may be lost for us!”.

And when Team RWBY was visiting Pietro’s lab, Pierrot said that James is paranoid.

Why the heck would CRWBY make an established-paranoid ptsd-suffering man a Villain???

It was established that Tyrian, you know, an antagonist, was trying to set up Ironwood for panic and failure.

And the whole Robyn Hill/Happy Huntresses group made his job infinitely harder.

And it’s kinda weird that they killed off the mixed-race character at a time racism to Asians was very prevalent.

Hey anon! Sorry it took a little longer then usual to get to this ask. My ask box has been full lately and with craziness at work I've been a little slower getting to asks then usual.

Anyways into the meat of this ask, I honestly do not understand CRWBY's decisions either. Even ignoring the absolutely pathetic excuse of a redemption arc for Emerald and Hazel, just only looking at James, he was arguably set up to be redeemed from a certain standpoint if that makes sense. We have been repeatedly told James is scared and traumatized (and people insisting that somehow makes his weak or pathetic are really showing their true vile colors and I pray they never meet people who have been traumatized) and in desperate need or help. And then the mains come in and they are painted as the help James so desperately needs but they screw up along the way along with James but in the back of our minds we know, he's traumatized and exhausted and has his his emotional breaking point and has started going into a nosedive emotionally and more then ever needs a helping hand to reach out and stop the death spiral and we've seen Ruby try and reach someone actively trying to like kill her, so why wouldn't she try and reach the man who has been shown to just need help and someone to care?

And then we get to volume 8, and as soon as episode one they start hamming up how bad and evil and dangerous James is and I realized all of that set up and potential....had gone down the drain. They never had any intention of letting James be saved. It didn't matter he was traumatized. It didn't matter he had been intentionally triggered and had been manipulated and messed with by Salem's forces since volume 4. It didn't mater that Robyn and Jacques where both making his job harder very much intentionally. It didn't matter he had done so much good before and was always painted as morally gray, he was a monster now and nothing could ever change that so no one should even bother trying.

The whole this is only made worse be examining how James was treated compared to people who committed far far worse atrocities then James ever did. Add that on top of this all being done as you said during a time when hate against Asian people was at an all time high and for me it goes from weird to all out ableist and racist. I just cannot believe anymore the writers could not have known about the harm this would case. They just didn't care because for some reason they needed the mains to be 100% right and because James was shown to question that he had to be 100% wrong to ensure the mains could be right and pure and perfect not realizing that it stripped the mains of everything that made them likeable. The ability to look at them and relate to them and see them make mistakes but still be considered heroes. CRWBY stripped the ability for RWBY to ever be wrong and in doing so ironically stripped away their humanity. You can't emotionally connect with perfect and pure flawless human beings because no one is perfect and pure and flawless. We ALL screw up and trying to pretend otherwise is downright toxic and causes far more harm then good because it denies the harm one person may have caused another whether it was intentional or not.

It's okay to make mistakes. It's okay to screw up. It's okay to make a bad call in any situation, especially one as stressful as an immortal witch coming to kill everyone. What is not okay is trying to insist someone never ever made a mistake and trying to pretend harm one person caused another never happened. And that is what RWBY did to James. They denied the harm they caused him and blamed him for what they did to him and Atlas and Mantle, and that is wrong.

[thephantomessoftheopera]

Notes on Gaston Leroux‘s „The Phantom of the Opera“ - Chapter 27: „End of the Ghost‘s Love Story“

Artwork by @flaviamarquesart

<< Previous chapter

“End of the Ghost’s Love Story” is the most powerful chapter in the novel, because it reveals the full extent of Erik’s love for Christine. It is also the one that makes the story truly extraordinary, because it redeems his character and lifts him above the level of a gothic villain, who is usually defeated and punished in the end. This is why he is generally considered a “Byronic Hero” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byronic_hero). The Byronic hero is a complex, often tragic form of romantic anti-hero who is generally more villain than traditional hero, but who has at least one redeeming quality (usually connected to love) which makes him a sympathetic figure despite his flaws and/or crimes. The character type was created by the English poet Lord Byron in his works such as “The Corsair” and “Don Juan”, and became extremely popular in the 19th century. Except for his looks, Erik fits that classic character type in almost all other aspects (highly intelligent, tortured, violent, ruthless, manipulative and driven by an all-consuming passion).

The chapter’s title also makes it clear that the whole thing is a love story at its core - everything in the novel happened because Erik fell in love with Christine. It is, and has always been, the story of Erik’s love - he is the one character we follow up until the end.

The final chapter is narrated by Leroux again, but it draws on what the Persian supposedly told him when he went to visit him in his flat in the rue de Rivoli. When the Persian wakes up after losing consciousness in the water, he and Raoul are resting in the Louis-Philippe room, and Erik and Christine are taking care of them. Raoul has already woken up before the Persian, and is now asleep again.

The room itself astounds the Persian in how ordinary and old-fashioned it looks, and how much it contrasts with Erik’s general appearance (remember that the Persian had never been in Erik’s house before). Erik explains to him that the furniture once belonged to his mother, which explains why the style is so different from his bedroom, which is decidedly more „Erik“. The Persian also wonders why Christine, who is moving silently through the room and then sitting down beside the fireplace, ignores both Raoul and himself when tries to call her. The Persian believes that Christine is reading “The Imitation of Christ”, which is significant and which I will come back to a little later. The “opposites” theme is also present in this scene again, describing Erik’s figure as black and a demon, and Christine’s as white and an angel. The Persian finally falls asleep again.

When he wakes for the second time, Erik has already delivered him back to his flat according to the promise he made to “his wife”. The Persian immediately sends to find out what happened to Raoul, and learns that Raoul has disappeared and that Philippe’s body has been found on the shore of the lake under the opera house. The Persian has no doubt that Philippe was drowned by Erik (or “the siren”), and decides to denounce him to the police. However, his testimony is ridiculed, and he - like Raoul - is taken for a lunatic. The Persian then decides to write everything down and later hands his manuscript to Leroux (which is what we’ve been reading in these last chapters).

When he has finished writing his account down, Erik comes to visit him. He is clearly unwell and described as weak, leaning against the wall and “pale as a sheet”. The Persian accuses him of murdering Philippe and wants to know what happened to Raoul and Christine, whether they are dead or alive. Erik denies murdering Philippe, but the Persian doesn’t believe him. We don’t really know the truth though, so the “murder mystery” has no definite resolution and turns into more of a side note.

Erik tells the Persian that he is about to “die of love” for Christine. As I’ve mentioned before, I believe that the most likely physical cause of his death would really be the gunshot that Raoul fired at him, and a possible infection following that injury which would lead to his precarious state of health as seen in this chapter. This could metaphorically also be described as “dying of love” (because he wouldn’t have caught that bullet if he hadn’t been in love).

After turning the scorpion, Christine begged him to save Raoul, and she had already offered before to accept his proposal if he gave her the key to the torture chamber, but Erik did not care then, because he did not believe her. But when she swears to him that she will become his “living wife”, it‘s different as he finally sees in her eyes what he has been hoping to see - Christine’s genuine commitment. She means to go through with her promise and is accepting him as her husband at that moment - and this is why her commitment is powerful enough to break through to him.

According to their agreement, Erik takes the Persian aboveground, but since Raoul probably wouldn’t agree to leave, Erik drugs him and locks him up in the dungeon beneath the fifth cellar. Then he returns to Christine, who stands calmly waiting for him. Erik suddenly feels “shyer than a little child” as he approaches Christine, but she does not back away from him. He tenderly kisses her forehead and is overwhelmed with how good it feels to kiss her, as no woman has ever allowed him to, not even his mother. Christine even leans into his touch a little, and remains close to him after the kiss, „as if it were perfectly natural“.

Fear and disgust are very powerful, primal emotions, but Christine‘s feelings for Erik are strong enough to overcome both. Considering that no one, not even the Persian, was able to even look at Erik’s face without horror, I feel that Christine must have cared very deeply for him, as she allows his kiss without fear and without recoiling from him at all, even after everything he has put her through.

He falls at her feet and starts crying of happiness, and seeing his tears, Christine starts to cry as well. Erik tears off his mask so that he won’t lose any of her tears on his skin, and still Christine shows no sign of horror or disgust. And she doesn’t only allow him to touch her, but she also touches him of her own free will and takes his hand, saying “poor, unhappy Erik”. I feel that this is the moment when the full expanse of his life’s tragedy truly hits her. She is not only the first woman, but the first person in his entire life to treat him with tenderness and acceptance.

Gratitude and love for her overwhelm him and make him realize that he has forced her choice. He puts the gold wedding ring into her hand, setting her free and telling her that he knows she loves Raoul and that she is free to go and marry him whenever she pleases. He „calmly cuts his heart to pieces“ and puts her happiness before his own in this final expression of true love and sacrifice. For as damaged as he was, the ending proves that Erik truly loved Christine because his love is ultimately selfless. There is also no bitterness in his feelings towards Christine after she leaves - he has always loved her, and still continues to love her. He still feels protective of her: “I’d better not hear that anyone has touched a single hair on her head!” Christine gave him “all the happiness in the world”, and he is grateful to her for this gift. His love for her redeems him as a character and proves to be his moral compass - before, he considered himself “outside the human race” and therefore not bound by common moral values.

In the previous chapter, Christine is shown reading what the Persian believes to be “The Imitation of Christ”. I don’t think that is a coincidence, and I also believe that the name “Christine” was perhaps even chosen for her on purpose (she was originally named Pauline, according to Leroux’s manuscript). Christine becomes a “Christ figure” here in two ways: through her sacrifice, she saves the lives of Raoul, the Persian and everyone in the Opera. But she also offers acceptance and love to a sinner, an outcast who has been shunned by society - and this is an extremely powerful gesture. She possessed the strength necessary to see Erik as a human being, and that is what sets her apart from everyone else. Her love here transcends the realm of romantic love and becomes almost divine - all-encompassing, forgiving, healing.

Christine may superficially fit the traditional image of a “damsel in distress”, but the would-be hero who was coming to rescue her didn’t get very far, nor could he do anything to save her. The only hero who saved Christine was Christine herself - and she also saved everyone else: Raoul, the Persian, everyone in the Opera, and Erik. Both Christine and Erik show incredible bravery in this chapter: Christine‘s bravery shows in her truly accepting Erik as a man and in saving Raoul, and Erik‘s bravery consists in letting her go, relinquishing his one chance in his life of having everything he has ever dreamed of.

Erik then goes to free Raoul and brings him to Christine, where Raoul and Christine kiss. Christine swears to Erik that she will come back to bury him with the ring, and then she finally kisses him before they leave.

Seeing Erik weeping and overcome with emotion, the Persian no longer doubts him. Erik tells the Persian that when he feels he is close to dying, he will send the letters that Christine had left with him and a few of her personal objects to him, and that this would be the cue for the Persian to put an obituary notice in the newspaper so that Christine and Raoul would know. Interestingly, that entire arrangement hinged on Erik himself announcing his death without anyone confirming it, because he could only mail things to the Persian if he was still alive. This leaves a lot of blank space for the reader’s imagination, because who knows if he really died…? The Persian, at least, never saw him again, but announced three weeks later that “Erik is dead”.

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